Day 1: We dropped off our little baby nugget at Grandmother Simpson’s for the night so we could wake up early to start our 10 hour drive. Kalea and Mia cried hysterically all the way back to Grandma Alo’s. I needed to be the strong one even though I wanted to cry too. It was a sad sad day.
Day 2: We drove. And drove. And drove. Let me back up. First we woke up at the crack of dawn (literally 4:30am) and wanted to leave by 5am. It was our way of insuring that the kids would sleep on the way. Guess what, only one did. Landen took about a 3 hour nap on the way there which was pretty good. We ended up watching about a billion Disney movies. I also had bought a ton of stuff to do at Michael’s before our trip to keep them entertained. And snacks, lots and lots of junk food. The trip was bearable and everyone was relatively happy for 5 people being stuck in a car together for 10 hours.
Once we got there we unloaded and went to the pool. The kids have been working on their swimming. Kalea has pretty much got it down. Mia is getting a little bit braver. Landen is just working on not drowning.
Day 3: DISNEY HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS
This was our first park. It was Star War’s weekend so there were characters everywhere. It was also nerd central. It was kind of cool to see Storm Troopers just walking around inspecting people as they passed though. Christian liked it, obviously.
This day was full of shows mostly. We started off doing a Little Mermaid show. It was so magical, even to me. If I had seen something like that when I was a little girl, I would have been in heaven. It made my heart swell for my 2 little girls who got to experience something magical come to life. And thus began the Disney Magic.
SHOWS
We went to a Indiana Jones show also where they did a lot of stunts and tricks. Men fighting, jumping from high buildings. Things catching on fire. I actually remembered this show from our many trips to Disney as a kid. It was fun to watch. Not to mention that Christian completely screamed and yelled his head off so that he could be picked as an extra on the set. He was hoarse for 2 days afterwards, but it was well worth it.
{Crouching on the floor}
We all got to watch an AWESOME car show with flips and high speed chases. It was about 98 degrees so it was BLAZING in the bleachers watching it but it was all worth it when this guy came out. CAAA-CCCHHHHOWWW!
Our last show of the day was a Beauty and the Beast Show. It was shaded and delightful.
PARADE
I brought my big heavy SLR everyday to every park. I complained about it but in the end it was worth it because the pictures were way better then what I would have gotten with a point and shoot camera. We saw our first parade and the kids were in AWE. Did I mention it was 98 degrees? So we all tried to shade ourselves under a small tree. Did I mention I had a headache that turned into a full blown migraine with nausea? I tried to tough it out but by 2:30 I thought I was going to pass out. We finally went to the First Aid station and got some IBProfen and a Coke for me. It knocked it out pretty fast and the popcorn Christian bought for me topped it off. I felt much better and was able to enjoy the parade and dance around like an idiot. It was my Happy Dance.
Waiting PATIENTLY for the parade to begin
The Incredibles
A Bug’s Life
Ratatouille
Monster’s Inc.
UP
Toy Story
Characters
We went to only a few rides. One of them was more of a game where you got to help Buzz Lightyear defeat Zurg. We waited about 45 min (the longest time we had to wait for any ride) and while we were waiting Landen saw
THIS PLUS LANDEN
= TERRIFIED
We also saw these guys. Not too bad for our first day.
Day 4: MAGIC KINGDOM (or as I like to call it “The Real Disney World”) part I
We started our day bright and early and got to the park at 9am. We were planning heading straight to the rides that get filled up the fastest so we could miss most of the wait. We started the kids off easy with a ROLLER COASTER! Woooohoooo! It wasn’t crazy, by any means, but the kids weren’t expecting it. Landen was a little bit scared but he braved up throughout the day.
We did the Dumbo ride which was tame but fun for the kids. We then rode the Tea Cups. I remember getting so sick from these if you spin them fast. I’m not big into spinning. (Spinning = Barfing) so the girls and I only spinned our tea cup a little.
The kids wanted to ride the carousel. We tried to talk them out of it since you can ride those anywhere. But it must have been a “magical” carousel, cause on they went. I told the kids that when the ride started I wanted them to yell “YAAA” as loud as they could. I’m talking Old Spice commercial “YAAAA”. They refused to do it. So I did it the WHOLE ride. They’re not old enough for their parents to be embarrassing yet.
Did I mention that it’s hot in Florida? Like burn the top of your skull because you have dark brown hair hot. We ended up doing a partial day and coming back for a second round of “The Real Disney World” later so we could see the fireworks. So we ate some ice cream and headed on out so we could rest up for round 2.
Not Pictured:
Peter Pan’s Flight
Dumbo the Flying Elephant
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
Mickey’s Philharmonic (which we watched twice because it was so dang HOT!)
Round 2:
Mostly we came back for the Electrical Parade and the 10pm Fireworks. However… there was still time. So I made everyone go on It’s a Small World.
And of course had to take pictures when they represented HAWAII.
We headed over and rode Tomorrowland Speedway. Landen kept screaming “MARIO KART!!’ Our little guy was so excited to be able to race his very own “mario kart”. Christian even got it on video. Lucky boy.
We ended up catching a show called “Dream Along with Mickey”. I won’t bore you with pictures of that show but I will bore you with more pictures of my kids waiting for the show to begin.
ELECTRICAL PARADE (my pictures don’t do it justice.)
Landen was a little bored before it began. He kept hearing shooting from a nearby arcade so I made him show me how he would shoot a gun.
Mostly he just flashed gang signs at me.
Alice in Wonderland
Cinderella
Snow White and the Seven Dwarves
Pinocchio and Puff the Magic Dragon
Afterwards we watched the fireworks. Our seats weren’t great but it was still “Magical”, naturally.
And thus ends Day 4.
Day 5: Epcot
This was supposed to be our 1/2 day. Leave-at-noon day. This turned into Kristy-hunting-Princesses day. Whoops!
Here are the Princesses we hunted. It started with brief encounter with Aurora. Then once we stumbled upon Belle (and waited FOREVER for Beast to come too) it was about to rain. I was hoping and praying that rain would ruin our Princess Hunt. However, being at the end of a VERY LONG LINE has it’s benefits. I learned where most of the indoor locations were for each princess. In fact, we found Jasmine and Aladdin’s before they even showed up and had a few moments before others even arrived. It was a successful hunt.
Landen didn’t want anything to do with any of the Princesses. He flat out refused until Jasmine offered to tell him a secret. Aladdin ended up telling him a secret about a banana being inside of an apple. It was the only way we could get Landen anywhere near any Princesses. It worked like a charm.
Mulan
Mulan ended up telling Landen stories which kept his attention just as well. sneaky sneaky.
We did a couple of shows and rides at Epcot also. If you’ve never been on Soarin’… consider it your new favorite!! They lift you up with this huge dome shaped screen in front of you and it makes you feel like you are flying all over California. The wind blows, the smells change, the scenery is amazing. We all rode this twice. It was seriously AMAZING. It looks something like this:
(not my pictures)
We did a few Finding Nemo rides and even had a chat with Crush the Turtle. And got eaten by some sharks.
Day 6: Animal Kingdom
We started off our day at Animal Kingdom with a Dinosaur ride. This ride was a bit intense for Landen and Mia. Kalea wanted to do it again because there wasn’t a line but the 2 littler kids were a NO GO. We thought about trying to make them go again, but we thought better of it so we wouldn’t traumatize our kids.
We did some pretty wild rides at Animal Kingdom. I think I got kind of tired of taking pictures though because there are not nearly as many as the other parks. It poured rain on and off throughout the day. We did see some pretty awesome shows too including Festival of the Lion King and Finding Nemo – the Musical!
The one show I DID NOT like was It’s Tough to be a Bug. It was so intense for littler kids that it made other people’s kids start crying. It was actually really sad. I felt like maybe it needed an age limit so that these poor little ones wouldn’t have been so traumatized. However, our kids are stone cold and weren’t even phased. I did feel bad for the parents who had to calm their little ones though.
There weren’t as many rides at Animal Kingdom but one that Mia especially loved was Expedition Everest where it takes you all the way up the mountain while The Abominable Snowman tears the track apart as you go. You get whipped all over the place and even backwards. It was cool cause it got pretty cold as you went further up the mountain. It actually made me feel kind of sick. I’m such a wimp.
Characters
We got to meet a few characters. It rained on us a bit so we don’t look our best (especially me) but we got to meet some favorites. By favorites I mean Christian got to meet Pocahontas. Lucky man!
And then of course we FINALLY got to see Mickey and Donald.
King Louie and Baloo from Jungle Book
The last thing we ended up doing was a Safari. It was POURING rain during the safari so we got some good shots of some of the animals. However, I was bummed cause we didn’t get to see any big cats. Oh well.
Day 7: Magic Kingdom (part II)
We were all so tired by Day 7. Exhausted and could barely get up but we knew we only had one more day of magic before our long trek home. We got there pretty early and saw Mickey and friends riding the train for the park opening. We had no idea it was going on, but we caught the end of it. It’s a pretty cute entrance. I have to say, I love that Disney World thinks of EVERYTHING. They make everything a production. It’s amazing.
We started our Princess hunt early. Kalea and Mia both brought princess dresses. Kalea is the only one who wanted to wear hers though. I’m not surprised though. I think it started to get itchy and annoying in the heat.
We went on a Buzz Lightyear ride/game where you get to defend the galaxy against Zurg and after we left the ride we got to meet BUZZ!! Landen was so excited (since I’ll we’d seen is princesses).
.
To escape the heat we went and did a ride called Stitch’s Great Escape where he is captured and then he escapes and spits all over you (water, I hope). It was definitely refreshing from being out in the heat. One of the funniest shows was Monster’s Inc. Laugh Factory. They were picking on people in the audience and just cracking everyone up. Kalea wanted to go again and see if they’d pick us the next time. We explained we could go all day and the odds of being pick were pretty slim. Oh well, on to the next thing!
While Landen and I waited in line to meet Buzz, Christian took the girls on Space Mountain. BACKGROUND STORY: As a kid I was ALWAYS too short to ride Space Mountain, and then when I was finally tall enough I was too scared. So after Christian took the girls, I went a second time with Kalea. My brother Luke would be proud. Actually, it wasn’t my favorite because it whipped my neck like a Willow Smith. At least I can say that I did it. Oh, and it did make me a little sick. wimp.
Next on our list to meet was Ariel and Prince Eric. Well, as Florida naturally does, it thunderstormed. And as soon as those sounds are heard they corral the Princess back inside to safety. We waited for at least 30 minutes and were 2nd in line when they whipped that Princess away from us. And this is Kalea’s face of disappointment.
Luckily Christian and Landen were in line to meet some Fairies including Tinkerbell so we just went from one line to the next. It was still a long wait but we got to see those Fairies and Landen was actually excited about it too!
We rode a few of my favorite rides as a kid and a few that weren’t even built WAAAAY back then. My personal favorite as a kids was Pirates of the Caribbean. Some of it was the same and then a ton of it had changed also. It was fun to see it again and relive it. The other thing we did was the Country Bear Jamboree. It turned out to be really weird. I remembered as a kid, but I didn’t remember it being so uh… country. If we wanted redneck we would have stayed in North Carolina!
My other favorite as a kid was the Haunted Mansion which has also changed a bunch because it’s been 20 years and technology is ever changing. It wasn’t nearly as scary as a grown up though. Just in case you were wondering.
We ended up catching an afternoon parade…. again. We weren’t planning on seeing this many parades but this one ended up being “special”. We had this CRAZY Asian lady (not me) next to us that screamed at each character until they had no choice but to look our way. I’m sure everyone thought she was super obnoxious but we were thankful for the VIP treatment because of her craziness.
The last things we did were Thunder Mountain Railroad and Splash Mountain. After we rode on Thunder Mountain, Landen REFUSED to ride on Splash Mountain. We walked by a few times and he pointed and screamed “I am NOT riding on that!!” So I told him we wouldn’t. However, I am a liar. When we got in line with out fast passes he had no idea what ride we were in line for. I told him it was the “bunny ride”. He really didn’t have time to figure it out. Once we were on, he kept asking “this isn’t Splash Mountain?” Eventually I told him the truth and he willfully submitted and actually enjoyed himself. After we got off he kept saying “Splash Mountain isn’t scary” like he was trying to convince himself.
Thunder Mountain The “Bunny ride” aka Splash Mountain
On Saturday we got up, packed and headed on home to pick up our squishy little baby that we missed so much. When she gets excited she kicks. I’ve never seen her kick so hard. We missed our sweet little baby but it was one of the best experiences to go to Disney World and watch the magic through my children’s eyes. I guess in about 7-8 years we’ll have to do it all over again.
HAPPY VACATIONING FROM THE SIMPSONS!
